med people are so annoying "This family's 8 year old child who was about to go through a major surgery and kept crying that she was hungry so they pitied her and gave her food, she then had a heart attack in the surgery. They're so stupid 😒" girl they didn't know that could happen or why it happens. it takes so little time to explain to them that will happen instead of telling them "no food" with no explanation 10 times
"Before surgery, your body’s reflexes that protect your airway are relaxed by anesthesia. If there’s food or liquid in your stomach, it will near certainly come back up and go into your lungs, which can cause choking, a severe lung / heart infection or even a heart attack. That’s called aspiration, and it is life-threatening. It's hard, but it's only a single day to prevent near certain death. Not eating or drinking beforehand massively lowers the risk and helps prevent these life threatening situations under anesthesia." <- TIP: patients have brains which allows them to receive information just like you
I have four kids. I’ve had one or another of them need some kind of surgical procedure that requires anesthesia four or five times over the past 15 years.
This Tumblr post is the first time someone has explained to me *why* I couldn’t feed them before those instances.
I’m not stupid. I understood that just fine. Hell, my kids would have understood that just fine. But no one bothered to tell us.
i did know this before having kids (i have six). we have a kid that's needed multiple procedures requiring anesthesia. and every single time, i am asked multiple times if i'm sure he was not given any food or water after a certain point.
every single time i have had to say, "i understand that if he had food or water, he could aspirate it into his lungs under anesthesia. i am not lying to you." THEN someone would make a little note and i would stop being repeatedly asked.
not a single time was that risk explained to me. the only reason it came up was because i already knew. i still don't understand why it isn't standard pre-op counseling or pre-op check information, when me as a parent acknowledging the actual risk also put THE MEDICAL STAFF at ease because i conveyed that i had informed understanding as reason to not lie about giving my kid food.
"maybe some people will get nervous and refuse surgery" okay so they need more counseling about risks and anxiety, not less information in a way that actually does endanger their child or themselves!
Reblogging to save a life and teach medical professionals basic communication skills
This is good advice for everyone including non-medical personnel. It turns out that it isn't just autistics who learn better if you explain why you're asking them to do a certain thing a certain way, everyone learns better.
Pretend I am training you for your first day at my taproom, and consider the following examples:
1. "Please make sure to wash the glassware before you put it in the sanitizer machine."
2. "Please make sure to wash the glassware before you put it in the sanitizer machine. I know it looks and acts like a dishwasher, but it isn't, so don't. "
Or
3. "Please make sure to wash the glassware before you put it in the sanitizer machine. I know the sanitizer machine looks and acts like a dishwasher, but it isn't because a dishwasher will empty and refill between cycles. This machine doesn't do that, it recycles the same sanitizer solution over and over. So if you put a dirty glass in, not only will the glass still be dirty but all the other glasses will get dirty too and we'll have to empty and refill the machine. Which you really do not want to do because thing takes almost an hour to come back up to temperature, and thats a gigantic pain in the ass when you get in the weeds. So just remember to wash the glasses first, okay?"
Now tell me: which one of those are you gonna remember?
I need people to get real comfortable explaining the Why's and I need that to happen so fast, because everyone's lives will be so greatly improved if we stop assuming everyone already knows everything. (And if you already know, you get to say so and look like a smartie! Win/win!)
